The "tripwire force" IIRC was not vietnam but south korea and europe which was meant to trigger us involvement in the case of an invasion by communists i.e. the Nork's and Soviets respectively.
Your 'US Casualties leads to greater us involvement' theory seems to be contradicted by reality that the US is operating in a very casualty averse way. In addition, the republicans clearly want to have it both ways: they criticize obama for not doing enough, but are not willing to advocate for large troop numbers for a US led ground deployment.
Also I would not describe gary's or bob's comments as a "minimalist-aggression hypothesis", Gary describes the republicans as the 'nattering nabobs of negativity' who don't' want any responsibility except to later be able to constantly make bullshit complaints.
Bob's complaint seems to be that there is obama is not flag waving, war mongering, or carrier landing/mission accomplished moments and instead obama is downplaying the conflict. Bob's comment is free of substance.

Recall Thomas Hobbes teaching that subjects should not be allowed to admire any sovereign but their own, thus Obama CANNOT have been upstaged by Putin, because Putin is over there and Obama is over here. Of course this was Obama's plan ALL ALONG!

Or so we're told by the mandarins and their lackeys. I choose to believe reality.

While I have no doubt that Obama was going to leave Kerry and the neocons hanging out to dry on Syria, it is not necessarily the case that he was going to do it via Putin's proposal. He was likely to do it via losing the vote in the House; a painful loss of face domestically and internationally but an approach that would bolster the separation of powers, an Obama-Biden goal, and spread the blame so that AIPAC couldn't punish Obama and the Democrats for Obama's uppity independence.

Putin's proposal sets the stage for further exclusions of the neocons as the US and Iran engage in rapprochement.

What I fear most is that the neocons will conduct another false flag and try to blame it on Iran, perhaps even a nuclear false flag; alternatively they can have Israel attack Iran directly scuttling any chances for a new direction in the world away from their diseased madness.

Ask yourself who is wailing and gnashing their teeth and rending their garments at the sudden outbreak of peace? The usual collaborators:

You'd be more convincing if you addressed actual progressive arguments against the war. Such as:

4. We've already played this game before and are still mired in two wars at a cost of over a trillion dollars because of it.

5. We are currently cutting billions of dollars in "non-defense discretionary spending" in the U.S. while we expand our list of military adventures.

6. We were already promised a war that would last "day's possibly weeks, I doubt months". It lasted 7 years and we still have nearly 50,000 troops in the country.

7. We don't know who the rebels are or what they would do in Qaddafi's place.

8. The current "90-day", "no boots on the ground" strategy is likely to turn this into a protracted bloody civil war, since the rebels are not capable of winning a one-on-one battle with Qaddafi's forces.